Dating abroad as an American has taught me to embrace being spontaneous and communicate what I want

07.10.2023 - 13:51 / insider.com

Some people collect souvenirs while traveling. I collect dating stories. And in the past two-plus years of living in Europe, I've collected many.

There was the South African guy I fell madly in love with during a whirlwind weekend romance in Warsaw — only to be ghosted on Monday morning when he returned to London. There was the Russian guy who, at the end of our first date, asked me to do a full photo shoot of him to show his Instagram fans he "lives a good life."

Then there was the Belgian guy who looked nothing like his photos once we met after a month of exchanging WhatsApp messages, and the Austrian guy whom I dated for a month and who made me a PowerPoint presentation about why we should still be together six months after we broke up. The list goes on — as does my search for love.

And while the stories are fun to tell over FaceTime with my friends back in the States or over cocktails in Vienna, where I've settled, my collection of overseas dating stories has also taught me many valuable lessons.

Forget walking tours; when I first moved to Europe in 2021, it was actually Bumble that helped me explore new cities. I learned quickly that dating a local was the best way to discover the best parts of a town and find its little hidden gems. Now that I live in Vienna, nearly all of my go-to spots are places I was taken for a date when I first arrived.

I remember waking up one morning to a voice note from a guy I'd been seeing who was eager to get away over the summer. Given that we'd had fun on our first two dates, he wanted to know whether I'd be up for going on a weekend vacation with him. "Why the hell not?" I thought.

While we didn't end up together in the end, we did wind up in Turkey for the weekend, and I got to experience the joy of exploring a new city and getting to know somebody over kebabs and hammams. Embracing spontaneity and experiences over outcomes has proved time and again to be the way to go.

Chivalry feels ingrained in European men. (OK, most of them.) For one, on nearly every date, if the road were to the right of us, my date would always insist on walking on my right to block me from traffic. One guy I'd been seeing in Warsaw even surprised me at the train station when I was leaving; he wanted to see me off properly and help me load my luggage on the train and showed up just in time to do so.

While I consider myself fiercely independent and fully capable of opening my own doors and carrying my own bags, I can't help smiling at these gestures and daydreaming about raising a son who also values chivalry.

My most successful date in Europe ended in friendship. Back in October 2021, I was sitting on a bench, unsure of what to do on my last day in Vienna, when I saw a sign on a bike